This invention relates to decorative ribbon slitters of the class employed for longitudinally shredding a ribbon into strands which may be curled, as is commonly done in the craft, floral and gift shop trades.
In such trades it is common practice to slit or shred the ends of ribbons to create an artistic or ornamental effect on wrapped packages. This also is commonly done in household applications when it is desired to gift wrap a package.
The most common practice is to perform the slitting operation manually, cutting the ribbons by hand. This is difficult to do, particularly if it is desired to create a stranded product the components strands of which are of exactly the same width, or have side edges which are exactly parallel to each other.
There also are various tools known to the prior art for achieving this operation.
It is the general purpose of the present invention to provide a decorative ribbon slitter including a kit of individual ribbon slitting components having teeth or knives arranged in various spacing patterns so that the components may be used interchangeably as required to create desired effects in the finished product.
It is a further object of the present invention to provide a decorative ribbon slitter which is simple and inexpensive to manufacture, efficient in operation, adaptable for use on a variety of ribbon materials, and easy to use.
Broadly considered, the decorative ribbon slitter of our invention, which accomplishes the foregoing and other objects, comprises first and second jaw members and hinge means hinging the jaw members together at one of their ends for angular movement relative to each other between open and closed positions.
Aligned openings are present through the jaw members adjacent the hinge. A post stop is mounted in the openings for limiting the degree of opening of the jaw members. Resilient means are mounted on the post stop for biasing the jaw members in the direction of their open position.
A plurality of longitudinally spaced, ribbon-slitting teeth are mounted on the inner surface of one of the jaw members for engaging the ribbon in the closed position thereof, and for slitting it into shreds having a width determined by the spacing of the teeth as the ribbon is drawn through the slitter.
In particular, the slitter is characterized by the presence of a longitudinal slide or groove on the inner face of one of the jaw members and by a plurality of associated tooth-mounting slides which may be mounted interchangeably in the groove. This makes possible creating various patterns of shredded products, depending upon the spacing of the teeth in the various slide components.